D-League Pre-Draft Power Rankings / Allocation ListNovember 7, 2008Maurice “Mo” Baker played all of 06-07 with Dakota and a large chunk of 07-08 as well before being bought out by Paris-Levallios in the French League. He’s a big-time scorer plain and simple, despite being fairly limited athletically and nothing more than an average perimeter shooter at best. Baker just has a terrific feel for putting the ball in the basket, not always terribly efficiently albeit, but still being capable of creating offense out of nothing, which is more than most players in this league can say. He’s a tough, experienced player with strong intangibles who brings a lot to the table in a league like this, and will even make teammates better on occasion, and surely help win games. [Read Full Article]NBA D-League Showcase, Day OneJanuary 15, 2008Maurice was phenomenal in his first game of the Showcase. He scored 41 points on a variety of plays, and was perfect from the line, shooting a whopping 17 of 17. He punished the Iowa defenders by knocking down open jumpers off of screens and curls and drew contact on the defender for several and-1 opportunities. Clearly we’re talking about an extremely versatile scorer with outstanding instincts for putting the ball in the net.

Baker showed good body control while hitting a baseline floater and demonstrated a good two-man game with Rod Benson getting the kickout for an open 20”. Baker showed some very steady play while smoothly pulling up in transition and knocking down a 20” jumper, and also stole an outlet pass and calmly banked it in off the glass from 15” out. He can finish with either hand around the basket, and has nice toughness and strength for a guard. His mid-range game is a real strength of his, making him an extremely difficult player to guard because of the many ways he can score the basketball.

The arena in Idaho was buzzing about Baker after the game. The 41 points he scored came effortlessly, and the crowd was duly impressed. He attacked the basket aggressively and is a very versatile ball handler with a high acumen for the game, but despite his upper body strength it’s not clear yet if he has the athleticism to take it to the next level. His quickness looks somewhat average compared with some of the other guard prospects here, so it’s hard to say whether he’d be able to translate this same scoring ability to a higher level. [Read Full Article]